


Yes, the Window Still Opens If the Door Is Closed

by HarveyWallbanger



Series: Hanna Is Not Fan-Wanking Disguised As a Story [1]
Category: Hanna Is Not A Boy's Name
Genre: Gen, fan-wanking disguised as a story, pretentious shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-15
Updated: 2012-03-15
Packaged: 2017-11-01 23:45:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/362615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarveyWallbanger/pseuds/HarveyWallbanger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Your next defragmentation is scheduled for 12:21 a.m..</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yes, the Window Still Opens If the Door Is Closed

**Author's Note:**

> Does what it says on the tin: fan-wanking disguised as a story. It doesn't have to happen this way, but it could. I am not Tessa Stone, and this school is not Tessa Stone. I'm definitely not being paid for this, either. P.S. Title comes from Candy Castle, by Glass Candy.

If anyone asked, you'd say that it's like sleeping. The comparison is neat and reassuring, two qualities you enjoy. It also means that you, of course, must sleep, if you can liken this other thing to that. Everyone sleeps. Even you.  
Sleep, perchance to dream. Aye, there's the rub. For in that sleep, what dreams may come must give you pause. It's like lucid dreaming. That's the more apt comparison, but not everyone does that. You're aware that you're in a dream, and you can function within the logic of the dream. Stop yourself from drinking cologne instead of liquor, for example. Stop yourself from running into traffic. Stop yourself from waving a gun at complete strangers, which is inappropriate, even if they have broken into your home. Is it breaking in if you've forgotten to lock the door, though? You used to remember to do that, if nothing else.  
Or, perhaps, the lock is broken. That seems to be going around. Somebody seems to have forced the lock on the cabinet, the one you keep inside of you, the one where you keep all of your curios. Your artifacts. That's the actual, technical term. An artifact, a once-buried trace of something that once inhabited the physical matter of this body. Your progenitor. Your childhood self. Your evil twin. It doesn't matter how you think of him. He's just a collection splintered data, futilely clinging to itself in an effort to maintain consciousness. It's sad, really.  
You locked the door. You know you did. In your dream, your mind keeps returning to that. To the door, and to the cabinet where you keep your pistols, and to the peculiar ache in your side. Perhaps it's indigestion. Of course you eat. Everyone does.  
Sometimes, you even wake up hungry, as though you've done something to work up an appetite. Sometimes, you wake up sated, as though, in sleep, you'd gotten a head-start on the processes that keep you alive. That's very efficient of you. Sometimes, you wake up already dressed, if a bit rumpled. Sometimes, you wake up with your car keys in your hand. You make a mental note to try to remember where you might have driven. Once you've had a drink, to steady your hands. If you keep shaking like this, you might knock something loose.  
It used to be that it only happened on Friday nights, when you have your special sleep, which isn't quite sleep. Lately, though, it's been happening nearly every night. The liquor knocks you out, but it doesn't stop you moving.  
Moving. Run, you hear yourself say. For an instant, an image blasts itself onto your eyes, like the queer florescent shapes left by a sudden flash of bright light. It's a boy, very young, with red hair. A girl, with streaks of blue in hers. A very tall man with skin the yellow and blue of decay. They look frightened. You hear yourself say, Run, and they look at you, differently; not frightened, but confused.  
That can't be right. It has to be corrupted data. Something from a film you once saw. But you hate most contemporary films. A television show, then. You haven't been near a television since you took one apart as a boy. No, not you; the other one. He was always fiddling with anything mechanical or electronic. When he was fifteen, he built his sister a car. When he was twenty, he built a home computer. When he was forty, he built a man. You haven't seen him since. You make a note to check your memory for any references to him.  
A very loud noise shakes you back into the scene. There's the scent of something burnt, and a slight ache in your ears. But far away, and heading to someplace further on, like the point of vanishing in a painting. What were you thinking of? Right. That film, or television show. The picture's gone blank. It's just your sitting room, now. You scratch your head, as though doing so will cause fresh thoughts to germinate and bloom. What strange little tics people develop. When you touch your head, you cannot feel your hair or skin. Your hand's gone numb. You look at it. It's not your hand, at all. Or, it is, but it's holding a gun. You thought you'd locked that cabinet. Locked it, then literally thrown away the key.  
But then, you went to the hardware store, bought a crowbar, and prised it open. Ah, yes, now you remember. Where have your guests gotten to?  
Something's making an awful racket down the hall, in the vestibule. Is that glass breaking? You can clean it up tomorrow. Though, it is tomorrow. Without looking at your watch, you know that it's close to one in the morning. Mustn't waste time.  
Oh, my ears and whiskers- I'm late, I'm late, I'm late! You smile. The expression warms you, though you don't feel any genuine contentment at recalling being read Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, many years ago, by a woman who has your eyes. But if she has your eyes, whose eyes do you have?  
Your limbs are beginning to feel heavy. When you were thirty, you were hypnotized at Brighton Pier. Well, not really; you faked it for the benefit of the audience. It cost you nothing to do so, and after the show, the hypnotist bought you a drink for being a good sport. I can always tell, he said, when it's not genuine. Whenever you begin to defragment, you find yourself back there. Remembering it, as though the brain that recorded those memories is under your hair, and scalp, and skull. Wearying more with each step, you pull yourself upstairs.  
You're losing track of your surroundings. You're on Brighton Pier, drinking with the hypnotist, then on the stage, then picked out of the crowd. You're being read to by a woman who has your eyes. You're in a theatre, looking at a man who's turned blue. You're in the sitting room, with a couple of scared teenagers, and a dead man. You're trying closed doors, looking for a locked one, because that leads to your guests. It must be a game, like the ones you played long before the first broken alarm clock, and the engineering courses, and the A Level in Organic Chemistry that people said you'd never, ever need. Somewhere, is hidden everything you seek. Though, the house is big, and seemingly bigger with every ponderous step, you know that, very, very soon, you shall have it.


End file.
